Access to Art With a MetroCard Swipe

By SEWELL CHAN

Published: June 30, 2005

Like all New York City subway riders in the 1970's, Ronay Menschel encountered stations that were decrepit, dimly lighted and covered in graffiti. ''The conditions were deplorable,'' she recalled, ''and the environment was unwelcoming and oftentimes threatening.''

But Ms. Menschel had an opportunity to weigh in. A former top aide to Mayor Edward I. Koch, she represented the city on the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's governing board from 1979 to 1990. One of her major accomplishments was the creation of a public art program.

The program's 20th anniversary, and its tremendous growth across a variety of artistic media in subway and train stations, are celebrated in an exhibition, ''Along the Way: M.T.A. Arts for Transit,'' opening today at the UBS Gallery in Midtown.

If public art is populist by definition, Arts for Transit is unabashed in emphasizing visual delight. While a few abstract works, like the graphic designer Milton Glaser's murals in the Astor Place station, adorn the system, a majority seek to entertain, and perhaps even inspire, the everyday rider.

The show, which has information on 154 works, includes copies of the bronze sculptures from Tom Otterness's ''Life Underground,'' a playful array of creatures, including an alligator emerging from a manhole cover. The work, installed in 2001 on the stairwells and platforms at 14th Street and Eighth Avenue, has become one of the most popular in the subway system.

Two of the largest works in the program, Roy Lichtenstein's ''Times Square Mural'' and Jacob Lawrence's ''New York in Transit,'' also took the longest to be realized. Both were installed, posthumously, in the renovated Times Square station.

Lawrence was too frail to oversee the fabrication of his glass mosaic mural, commissioned in 1990 but not completed until 2001, the year after his death. His last public work, the mural is a paean to the city's recreation, street life and vibrant neighborhoods. His widow, Gwendolyn Knight, who died in February, consulted with the fabricator, Miotto Mosaics, to make sure the work was faithful to his proposal. The exhibition includes Lawrence's sketches in gouache and pastel.

Lichtenstein's panoramic mural, which includes references to the World's Fairs of 1939 and 1964, was fabricated in 1994 in porcelain enamel on steel but was put into storage after plans for the Times Square station were altered. The exhibition includes a collage and a drawing by the artist and large photographs of the final work. Lichtenstein died in 1997; the work was installed in 2002.

Most of the artworks are selected by a five-member panel that includes two transportation authority officials and three arts professionals.

The authority typically commits 1percent of total architectural expenses, up to $20 million, for public art, and half of 1 percent for projects above that amount.

Ms. Menschel, 63, said the artworks amplified the billions of dollars in repair and construction projects undertaken since 1982. ''The art both enhanced the improvements that were being made, gave the stations a special identity and, I believe, led to improved design guidelines overall,'' she said.

Sandra Bloodworth, the director of Arts for Transit since 1996, said the show was intended for ''the riders, the public, the people who ride the system daily.'' She spoke as workers finished installing the exhibition, which will be on display through Sept. 9. She is working on a book about Arts for Transit, to be published next year by Monacelli Press.

Transportation is omnipresent even in the exhibition poster, a large reproduction of Owen Smith's ''Subway Riders,'' a mural at the 36th Street station in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. The poster, to be hung in sites across the subway system, directs viewers to take the B, D, F or V trains to reach the gallery at 1285 Avenue of the Americas, between 51st and 52nd Streets.

Photo: Ron Baron's work, seats and all, is in the exhibition. It is to be installed along the Long Island Rail Road. (Photo by G. Paul Burnett/The New York Times)